Monthly Archives: January 2016

Here are the most extreme things to happen in college basketball between Friday, January 22nd and Thursday, January 28th… Biggest upsets 3) #50 Providence 82, #1 Villanova 76 (OT) [76 possessions] (9%), Sunday. Home teams in Big East play are 18-22 so far this season, the second-worst mark among conferences at this moment. (CAA teams […]

Saturday is the third edition of the SEC/Big 12 Challenge although it feels like the first because in the previous two, games were scattered across various days during the non-conference season. This season, it’s a coherent event, with all ten games taking place this Saturday. As a bonus, this event occurs right in the middle […]

Yesterday, SMU removed itself from the list of the unbeatens, the last of America’s 351 teams to do so. Give Larry Brown credit: at least he is consistent with his coaching philosophy. He wants his team shooting 2’s (despite the fact that the Mustangs have made 41% of their 3’s this season) and he doesn’t […]

Here are the most extreme things to happen in college basketball between Friday, January 15th and Thursday, January 21st… Biggest upsets 3) Duke and Savannah State not losing on the same day. Duke and Savannah State haven’t lost on the same day since December 6th of ‘08  mainly because Duke almost always wins when it’s […]

This season’s preseason rankings included a better prediction for a team’s pace that was primarily based on the head coach’s history. The prediction used up to five seasons of a coach’s past to project tempo for this season. In the case of new head coaches, the model just regressed the team’s previous season pretty heavily […]

Here are the most extreme things to happen in college basketball between Friday, January 8th and Thursday, January 14th… Biggest upsets 1) #343 Bradley 54, #229 Loyola Chicago 53 [60] (10%), Wednesday. There was only one major upset this week and that’s fine with me because the Bradley Braves deserve some attention. Specifically, the Braves […]

Home-court advantage is important in college basketball – even though it may be at an all-time low – but too often it gets ignored. I suspect we have the RPI to blame for this. The RPI doesn’t include venue in its strength of schedule calculation, and more profoundly, encourages users to look at a team’s […]

I’m on record as supporting mid-season firings. That’s a horrible way to put it, but there are clearly times where removing the head coach in mid-season can have benefits, and the case of UNLV firing – technically he wasn’t fired but work with me – Dave Rice on Sunday night is one of those. Rice […]

Here are the most extreme things to happen in college basketball between Friday, January 1st and Thursday, January 7th… Biggest upsets 2) #246 Youngstown State 100, #73 Oakland 98 [87 possessions] (9%), Monday. As long as Greg Kampe is coaching Oakland, the Grizzlies’ games will be fun. Kampe’s resume is the perfect combo of orange, […]

Here are the most extreme things to happen in college basketball between Friday, December 19th and Thursday, December 31st… Biggest upsets 3) #341 Southeast Missouri State 78, #206 Missouri St. 74 (10%), Tuesday 12/22. This wasn’t one of those upsets that grabs headlines. Missouri State has won just three games against D-I teams so far. […]